Australian partners are from Canberra (Australian Capital Territory), New South Wales and Perth in Western Australia.

In August the children from one of the schools in Australia visited Tidbinbilla Nature Reserve (ACT). The Reserve suffered from bushfires in January. They saw where the fire had burned the trees, some had started to grow new branches but many of them were dead. Only a few animals survived but there are lots of birds and the children saw a kookaburra as well as some kangaroos.

Liz, from the other partner school, has written from a small country town in New South Wales called Junee, about five hours south west of Sydney:

"There are twenty-nine students in my class, sixteen year 6's and thirteen year 5's. They are of mixed abilities but predominantly boys. They each have their own email address. Junee has around four thousand people and the weather here gets very hot in summer and we have frosts in winter but never
snow. We are about two hours from the New South Wales snowfields, so some
people go there for the day."

Ardross School was built in 1961 and since then there have been many changes. The library, built in 1991, now has a number of computers. We use these to access the internet ... we have pen pals from all over the world. This helps us to get to know how we are the same and how we are different. Sharing ideas helps people to understand each other. We like that we are the same but we also like that we are different.

Email from a pupil in Perth

I go to Ardross School, Western Australia. My hobbies are playing soccer and playing video games.

My favourite place is Rottnest just off the coast of Western Australia. Rottnest is peaceful and there is plenty of room to ride your bike. It is also a great place to fish and there are lots of places to visit and lots of beaches. Most of all I like the quokkas. Quokkas look like small kangaroos and are native to Rottnest.

Email from a pupil from Ardross School

I am eleven years old in 7th grade at Ardross School in Perth. My hobbies include playing sports like AFL (Australian Football League), cricket and rugby. I also enjoy hanging out with friends and playing lots of games like darts and bike races.

My favourite place in Western Australia is just off the coast of Garden Island in a 16 foot dingy. This place is my favourite place because it's so calm and peaceful until a big wave comes than it's a bit hectic but that doesn't happen very often. One time when we were fishing we saw seals jumping out of the water.

The best thing I did on the holidays was going to Adventure World which is an amusement park. The reason I like Adventure World is that there is so much to do, like you can go swimming or go on the rides. My favourite ride is the Rampage which spins around really fast. I like this ride because it's the scariest ride there, not that any of them are scary.